Bombings Bring New Challenges for Obama

WSJ reporters discuss the tragedy of the Boston Marathon bombings, the future of gun reform after a vote for increased background checks failed in the Senate and the latest gloomy forecast for the world's economy.

By

Peter Nicholas And

Sara Murray

Updated April 20, 2013 9:16 a.m. ET

President
Barack Obama
had hoped to keep his second term focused on an ambitious domestic agenda, but the Boston Marathon bombings demonstrated anew that crises can disrupt a White House's careful planning.

President Barack Obama hailed authorities for their work in tracking down suspects in the Boston Marathon explosions, saying "Tonight because of their determined efforts we've closed an important chapter in this tragedy."

Mr. Obama is working under a compressed political calendar, with a little more than a year before Congress is absorbed by the midterm elections. The Boston bombings have proved to be a diversion for a president who would rather be talking about economic recovery, education and his efforts to overhaul the nation's immigration laws.

On Friday morning, Mr. Obama spent an hour in the Situation Room meeting with more than a dozen of his top national security advisers about the manhunt playing out in Boston and progress in investigation. White House officials called off a routine press briefing, normally an opportunity for the White House to deliver its message on a range of issues.

The day before, Mr. Obama flew to Boston to speak at an interfaith service. Throughout the week, White House aides have issued statements and released photos aimed at showing that Mr. Obama has been on top of the fast-moving events in the bombing investigation.

With many details of the plot to harm people in Boston unknown, it remains unclear how quickly and successfully Mr. Obama can resume normal business. New information will shape whether Mr. Obama needs to direct more money to combatting terrorism, resources that he would like to invest in education and public works projects.

ENLARGE

President Barack Obama during an interfaith service to remember the three spectators killed and scores wounded in a terrorist attack at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, held at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston.
EPA

Michael Chertoff,
who served as secretary of homeland security under former President
George W. Bush
,
said he doesn't anticipate that the Boston attack will overtake Mr. Obama's larger agenda. Terrorism is already a national focus, he said.

"They will go back over events and see what lessons can be learned, but this is not going to cause a shift in priorities," Mr. Chertoff said. "This has been a priority for the last 11 years."

Map: Boston Area

People who have worked in the Obama administration describe a president who was determined to untangle the country from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars so that he could devote himself to what he calls "nation building" at home. Mr. Obama has withdrawn troops from Iraq and has sped up the timetable for pulling out troops from Afghanistan.

In his State of the Union speech in February, Mr. Obama laid out his priorities. Top billing went to preschool education, public-works projects and budget matters.

Past presidents have faced national security dilemmas with mixed success. The last year of Jimmy Carter's tenure was consumed by the hostage crisis in Iran. Lyndon Johnson was politically undone by the Vietnam War.

President George W. Bush signaled his intention to make education a chief focus when he sent a sweeping education bill to Congress in his first week in office. But the Sept. 11 attacks and the Iraq war came to dominate his presidency.

Mr. Chertoff, who was a Justice Department official in Mr. Bush's first term, said that before the Sept. 11 attacks he had reckoned that his focus would be on corruption and white collar crime issues. "9/11 was a huge paradigm shift that changed the face of the country and therefore, what a president has on his agenda. And there's no going back once that happens," Mr. Chertoff said.

Bill Clinton had more success in juggling his domestic agenda and national security concerns.

The Oklahoma City bombing, in the latter part of Mr. Clinton's first term, was at the time the worst attack on American soil. The following year, Mr. Clinton signed into law a welfare overhaul that was one of the defining acts of his presidency.

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